


The Lancet

by topidolharuka



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hospital, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, M/M, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-14
Updated: 2017-04-20
Packaged: 2018-09-24 05:58:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9706190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/topidolharuka/pseuds/topidolharuka
Summary: lan·cet. Noun.1. a small, broad, two-edged surgical knife or blade with a sharp point2. A prominent British medical journal3. The chronicles of Lance Sanchez-McClain, a young doctor with big dreams and an even bigger ego, as he navigates his first year of his surgical residency. Real life is much different than medical dramas, and real drama gets in the way of real life. All he wanted was a solid group of friends, a rival he could love to hate, and a couple cool surgeries thrown his way. But when the rival that he loves to hate turns out to be a decent guy he hates to admit he's in love with, and the hospital comes under financial attack from a for-profit medical behemoth, Lance's tale turns upside down.





	1. Lance Becomes a Doctor

It all started for Lance when he was 14 years old. His mother made a point of taking her kids back to her hometown a short drive from Varadero every couple of years to see her family. This may sound like a fun trip with its white sand beaches, but the family mostly spent their time in the rural area they don’t tell you about in travel guides. For a teenager who wanted nothing more than to play video games and eat nothing but highly processed junk food and pizza, staring abject poverty in the face for a month was not on the list of “cool things to do over summer vacation.” He had complained the entire trip. But things changed for him on the plane ride back. As he sat in his seat and flipped through the skymall catalogue, dog-earing the pages with things he wanted but could never convince his mother buy for him, the man in front of him began to have a heart attack. He heard a voice over the loud speaker calling out the words that would change his life.

  
“Is there a doctor on board?” Lance had never really cared much for stories about superheroes. But as he watched a man stand up in his seat and inform the staff that he was, in fact, a doctor, it was like he was staring Superman in the eye. He watched intently as the doctor took control of the situation and saved the man’s life. It was that moment that Lance decided that he become a doctor too.

  
After 4 years of high school, 4 years of undergrad, 4 years of medical school, half a dozen mental breakdowns, a serious quarter-life crisis, and a mountain of student debt, his dream was about to become a reality. He donned his new green scrubs for the first time and walked through the doors of Altea United General Medical Center. He stopped for a second to take it all in. He was finally a doctor.

  
“You’re not a doctor yet, you know.” A voice came from behind him.

  
He snapped around. “Excuse me?”

  
“You’re not a doctor yet. You’re one of the new interns, right? I can always tell when new ones come in. They have this look on their face like they are about to save the world. It’s really cute. But you aren’t a doctor yet, not until you complete your residency.” The person standing in front of him was about a head shorter than him with messy brown hair and glasses that took up half their face

  
“I heard you the first time, kid. You’re wrong though, I am a doctor. I took the Hippocratic Oath and everything.”

  
“’I swear by Apollo The Healer, by Asclepius, by Hygenia, by Panacea, and by all the Gods and Goddesses, making them my witnesses, that I will carry out, according to my ability and judgment, this oath and this indenture.’ See, I can do it too.” The kid had a smug grin on their face.

  
“What was that?” Lance responded, confused by the mention of all the talk of Gods and Goddesses.

  
“That was the Hippocratic Oath. At least the version they said back in Ancient Greece, they’ve modified it since. I can actually do it in the original Greek if you want. My pronunciation might be a little rusty though.”

  
“You can’t say that, you aren’t a doctor.”

  
“And neither are you. Glad we are finally on the same page.” The kid offered their hand out. “My name is Pidge, at least that’s what everyone calls me. I’m a lab tech here.”

  
Lance took Pidge’s hand. “I’m Lance. You look a little young to be a lab tech.”

  
“It’s the magical combination of having a baby face and skipping a grade or two. I’m the youngest in my department, but probably the most competent. It’s always good to have a lab tech as a friend.” Lance and Pidge began walking towards the door to the hospital proper, accessible only with a staff badge for security reasons.

  
“We can be friends but only so I can prove to you that I am a real doctor.” Lance smiled. Weird first impression aside, Pidge did seem nice. Having just moved halfway across the country, Lance was pretty low on friends at the moment.

  
Lance and Pidge went their separate ways as the former approached the area where all the new interns were gathering. He scanned the crowd, identifying his fellow interns by their most prominent physical characteristics. So far he had identified Beaver Teeth, Carrot Top, Hot Female Intern He Would Definitely Get to Know Later, Incredibly Sweaty Guy, Premature Balding, and Sasquatch. None of them looked like they stood a chance against Lance, who gave himself the nickname Aggressively Attractive Guy. At the front of the group stood a man with a white streak in his hair and a scar across his face. If his white lab coat and hospital issued clipboard were any indication, he was probably the doctor in charge of them.

  
“Good morning everyone. I’m Dr. Takashi Shirogane and I am the Chief Resident here at Altea United General Medical Center. Unfortunately, the attending in charge of the residency program is preoccupied with a patient at the moment, so I will be giving the introductions. Here at Altea United, we pride our self with patient care and-“

  
Dr. Shirogane was interrupted by the sound of the door opening. A man walked in, all eyes on him as he did so. With his long legs, shiny black hair, and annoyingly symmetrical face, Lance could have sworn this guy had bent the fabrics of time to make his entrance play in slow motion, wind from the fans set up in the hallway to dry a spill causing his shoulder length hair to flow in movie-like fashion. “You’re late Keith.”

  
“Sorry Shiro, I got stuck in traffic.” There he was. Lance’s natural born rival. This mullet man stood out far and above the other interns, he could just tell.

  
“It’s Dr. Shirogane when we’re at the hospital.” Lance turned back to the doctor. Apparently, this new guy already had connections with the Chief Resident. “Well since Dr. Kogane has finally showed up I might as well start roll call.”

  
Keith Kogane. That smug little bastard already thought he had one up on Lance. At least Lance didn’t look like he had stepped out of an 80’s fashion magazine. He probably only got into the program because he knew the senior staff. He probably didn’t know anything about surgery for that matter. Lance was going to be far and above the better doctor, he felt it.

  
“Dr McClain? Dr McClain!” Lance snapped out of it. Dr. Shirogane had been calling his name.

  
“Um, actually it’s Sanchez-McClain.” He corrected. Dr. Shirogane raised an eyebrow. “My mom got remarried to this Scottish guy when I was still young so we changed my name but I still like to have my Cuban heritage with me at all times, y’know.”

  
“Right.” Dr. Shirogane said coldly as he continued calling names.

  
As they moved onto the tour portion of the morning, Lance noticed Keith looking at him out of the corner of his eye. To Lance, this meant the Keith had accepted him as his rival as well. “What are you looking at, Mullet.”

  
“A moron, I presume.” Keith’s voice was low, as so no one but Lance could hear him. “Sanchez-McClain? Really? Talk about overshare. I’m going to give you a little hint, no one really cares about your family background. At least not as long as you’re an intern. And strutting in here like a peacock isn’t going to do much to make the other doctors like you, especially your resident.”

  
“First of all, I’m proud of my family background and my name, I don’t think it’s an overshare to give correct information. Second of all, you really shouldn’t be talking to me about first impressions considering yours was 15 minutes late.” Keith had already began making Lance’s blood boil. What was more infuriating was that it didn’t seem to affect him in the same way.

  
“Don’t overestimate how little I care for your family background or anything to do with your medical career that doesn’t have to do with mine.” There was ice in his tone. “I seriously don’t care what you think of me. I’m merely giving you some advice, which you are free to take or leave.”

  
Lance tried to maintain his focus on the tour. This was hard because the tour was very long and boring. Lance was anxious to start saving people’s lives. He had watched all of the medical shows, from Scrubs to House to Grey’s Anatomy, and while he would never admit it, he had even watched a bit of General Hospital here and there. It seemed like he had been studying forever, he was ready to start seeing patients.

  
As they came back to the beginning of the tour, Lance noticed a beautiful woman standing near the nurse’s station. She had platinum blonde hair so light, it almost looked white, which contrasted nicely against her deep brown skin. As Lance began to approach the woman to show his moves, Dr. Shirogane sidestepped him. “Dr. Fara, glad that you’re able to join us. I just finished giving them the tour of the hospital.”

  
“Thank you for taking over for Coran.” She turned back around and was even more gorgeous from the front. “Good afternoon interns. My name is Dr. Allura Fara and I’m Chief of Medicine here at Altea United. I am so happy to welcome you into our ranks. While I am your boss, I want you to feel like we are a family here. While I expect the utmost professionalism in front of the patients, around the hospital I would love it if we could be on a first name basis. I know that Dr. Shirogane has already given you the whole spiel, but I want to show my face and let you know that if there is anything you need, don’t hesitate to ask. Does anyone have any questions?”

  
“Hi, Dr. Sanchez-McClain here. Lance Sanchez-McClain This introduction has been wonderful, but I was wondering when we get to start surgery. I have a very steady hand and great precision. Not to brag but in medical school everyone called me the tailor because of how I thread the needle.”

  
Allura pondered her response for a second. “I’m sure your hand is very steady. I feel like I should reiterate something. Altea United is the only non-profit hospital left in the area, and as Chief it is my job to manage that budget so we don’t end up running ourselves into financial trouble. One of the ways I do that is by preventing lawsuits. So, unlike all the shows you see on television, until I am confident enough in your abilities as surgeons to not bring forth a slew of unnecessary lawsuits, your role in the OR will be as an observer. But if you keep your IV’s in clean and your paperwork in order, I’m sure you’ll be ready in due time.”  
What? Lance couldn’t believe it. 4 years in medical school and all he would be allowed to do is menial work. Meredith Grey got to solve mystery seizure case on her first day, why did he get stuck cleaning bedpans?

  
“It’s a good thing you’re great at threading needles, Dr. Overshare, because you’ll need that skill for all the sutures you get stuck doing your first year.” To make matters worse, Keith decided that to butt into Lance’s internal pity party.

  
“Why are you so happy, you’re in the same boat as I am.” Lance shot back.

  
“I don’t know if you were listening to Dr. Fara but she said that those who do good work get let into the OR quicker. Since I’m not a cocky know-it-all who seems to base all his medical knowledge off the latest primetime hospital drama, I would say I have a pretty good chance of getting into that OR before you do.” Joke’s on Keith, creating a rival on day one was classic medical drama.

  
“I’m cocky? You’re the cockier than I am, with your flowy hair and stupid face. I’ve never seen a single person with so much cock in my life.” Lance paused for a second. “That didn’t come out right.”

  
“Clearly.”

  
“The point is I’m going to get into that OR way before you.” If there was anything that could keep Lance fired up while doing meaningless busy work, it was a sense of competition.  
“Is that a challenge?” Keith took the bait.

  
“I’ll tell you what. First person picked to assist in the OR wins.”

  
“What is the prize for winning?”

  
Lance thought for a second. “When I win, I get to shave your mullet.”

  
“And what do I get when I win?” Keith was definitely interested.

  
“I’ll do whatever you want for an entire evening.”

  
“Kinky” Keith muttered to himself. “Alright, you’re on."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance's internship isn't exactly what he expected. It has been months and he hasn't even seen the inside of an OR. But on the same day that he gets an opportunity to assist in surgery, he gets assigned the world's most annoying patient.

“I can’t believe it’s been two months and I have absolutely nothing to show for it.” Lance moaned into his beer. The first couple of months of his internship had not exactly been what he had in mind. He figured that he would be in surgery within the first week, but so far the closest he had gotten was shaving the patients before the surgery starts. 

"That is not true, I hear no one knows his way around a razor quite like you. If the whole doctor thing doesn’t work out, you could always be an old timey barber.” Pidge replied. Despite their snarky comments, Pidge had quickly become one of Lance’s closest friends in the area. 

“Okay, I know that was meant to hurt me, but did you actually hear that I am the best at shaving old dudes?” Any sort of validation was welcome. The internship process was grueling and demeaning, with long hours, low pay, and no respect from anyone else in the hospital. Not even the patients respected them, trusting WebMD more than their actual MD. 

“I’m going to be honest, it has never come up.” 

“Well I think that it is great you have found something to be proud of. The first year is really tough, but you learn a lot from it.” Said Lance’s new friend Hunk. He also worked at the hospital, he was in his second year of his orthopedic residency. While the stereotype was that orthopedic surgeons were as cold and tough as the bones they break and reset for a living, Hunk was pretty much the sweetest person Lance had ever met. 

“I don’t feel like I’m learning anything.” Lance rested his head on the table. “Sure, I guess I’m better at drawing blood and intubating patients. But I came to this hospital to be a surgeon, I can’t learn how to perform surgery if I never see the inside of an OR.” 

Hunk put his hand on Lance’s shoulder. “You’ll get there. But there is a reason they have you wait, there is so much more to being a doctor than just cutting into people. Healing their bodies isn’t enough, you have to take care of them and heal their hearts.” 

“I’m not really interested in cardio as a specialty.” Lance groaned. 

“You know that’s not what he meant.” Pidge grabbed Lance and dragged him to his feet. “Come on, we said that we wouldn’t stay here too long anyway. We all have work tomorrow.” 

* * *

The next morning Lance went into work as usual. The locker room at the hospital was crowded, but it wasn’t really too much of a problem. For a brief moment at the start of a shift, he could watch as everyone changed from who they were in their limited free time, to who they were trying to become in the hospital. And for the hot ones, he at the very least he could watch them change clothes. He had ditched the traditional green scrubs early on and switched to navy, a color which he felt suited him much better. Even Hunk had admitted that they made his eyes pop. Keith, who he totally didn’t watch changing by the way, had opted for a maroon pair. He often came in with his hair still slightly damp, a fact that anyone would have notice, not just Lance who still wasn’t staring, as if he had come in a rush and didn’t have time to fully blow dry. 

“I hear they are going to let an intern in on a surgery” Lance’s gaze was interrupted. 

“Are you for real?” 

“I heard Dr. Coran talking about it. Apparently, the mice have been watching all the interns and reporting information to Chief Allura. The top intern gets to assist Shiro on one of his surgeries.” ‘The mice’ was the name the interns used to describe the team of nurses that were always scrambling around Allura. As pleasant as they were, they never seemed to talk to anyone but her. Somehow, they still knew everything that went on in the hospital. 

Was it going to be Lance? Certainly he had to be in the top three, after all people were noticing his amazing shaving skills so that counted for something. As Lance walked to his first patient’s room, lost in thought, he didn’t notice Dr. Shirogane, or Shiro, as the rest of the hospital called him coming up to him. “Excuse me, Dr. Sanchez-McClain.”

He turned around. Lance had admired Shiro since before he had even started working at the hospital. Shiro had graduated from the same med school as Lance did, and the stories of him were legendary. Top of his class, the only student to ever get a perfect score on Professor Erickson’s neuroscience final, and the leader of a study group that put out some of the best graduates Garrison Medical School had ever seen. When he learned that the resident he would be working under was THE Dr. Shirogane himself, suddenly the 48 hour shifts seemed more bearable. “Oh! Dr. Shiro, do you need something?” Perhaps this had something to do with what the other interns were talking about. 

“I’m sure you’ve heard by now that I have a surgery coming up that I will be looking for an intern to assist me on I’ve consulted with, Dr. Fara and we’ve narrowed it down to 2 interns.” The entire hospital knew about the little romance blossoming between Allura and Shiro behind the scenes, but in order to throw people off his trail Shiro tried to be as impersonal as possible with her to the public eye. It did nothing. “Do you have any idea who those two interns are?” Lance’s heart stopped, figurately speaking of course. Granted if his heart did stop, there was no one he would trust more to operate on it than Shiro. 

“Well, since you’re talking to me, I’m guessing I’m one of them.”

“You are correct.” Lance started breathing again. It sure would have been embarrassing if he had been wrong. “The other intern is Keith. Now I’m telling you this because I want you to know where you stand. You both have different skill sets that are equally important to becoming a doctor. What I would recommend is watching him and trying to determine what you can do to improve yourself. When it is time for me to do my surgery, I’m going to send out a page, and whoever gets to the OR first gets to assist on the surgery. Right now you two are even, but if I see a substantial improvement in either one of you, there’s a possibility I might send one of you a page sooner as a bonus. Is that clear?” 

“Absolutely. Thank you so much, I guarantee that I won’t let you down.” Lance couldn’t control his thoughts at that moment. He stepped proudly patient’s room, imagining what it would be like to be in that OR. 

“Good morning Mr. Klaizap. I’m Dr. Sanchez-McClain and I’m going to be taking care of you today. I see you have some nasty gallstones here. I’m going to get you set up with some IV fluid now and Dr. Smythe come in later to go over some of our treatment options.” Dr. Coran Heironymus Wimbleton Smythe was the attending in charge of the residency program and was well known for two things. The first thing was obviously having the weirdest name in the world, which is why he usually shortened it to Coran or Dr. Smythe, and being a fantastic general surgeon. 

“You’re a doctor, why do I have to meet with a second doctor? Why can you not tell me what I need to know?” The patient narrowed his eyes. He looked to be about 18 years old, with a red cap pulled firmly over all his hair. “Are you not a very good doctor?” 

“No, I assure you that I’m a fantastic doctor. But Dr. Smythe is a specialist at this and is going to be even better than me at treating you.” Lance set up the IV. “But as a fantastic doctor myself, I can tell you that you’re dehydrated and need some IV fluids, so I’m going to need your arm so I can set this bad boy up.” 

The patient cradled his arm against his body. “No one stabs Klaizap. Get me my real doctor, I don’t trust you.” 

“I am your real doctor, and I really need to get you hydrated.” Great, first patient of the day is a difficult one. “I’m not going to stab you; I’m just going to insert this into your vein so I can get some fluids flowing through your body.” 

“Are you poking it through my skin? Because that sounds a lot like stabbing to me. No one stabs Klaizap.” 

Not being able to put an IV in a patient would be the opposite of impressing Shiro. Lance had to think. He remembered what Hunk had said about caring for a patient’s emotions. “Listen, I understand being scared of needles, I also-“ 

“Scared? I’m not scared. I’m the bravest person of anyone I know.” Klaizap interrupted. “But I already told you that no one stabs Klaizap. That include fake doctors.” 

“I am a real doctor!” Lance said with a little more conviction than was probably necessary. “We can’t help you until we get you hydrated so you’re going to have to just trust me on this.” 

Klaizap paused. “Then we’ll settle this like men.” 

* * *

“So I spent the next 45 minutes playing Jenga with the world’s most annoying patient just to be able to place an IV.” Lance complained to Hunk as they enjoyed their lunch break. When Lance was particularly annoyed by a patient, he usually didn’t take time to do his chewing and his talking separately. He grabbed a fry from Hunk’s plate. “Because of him I was late for my rectal exam in room 212.” 

“Hey man, I can handle the talk-chewing thing, but if you are going to talk about rectal exams, you’re going to have to keep your hands off my fries.” Hunk pushed the plate out of his friend’s reach. “It’s tough being in the hospital, maybe he just wanted a friend.” “

Is this more of that ‘treat their heart’ shit you were going on about because I tried that and it didn’t work.” Lance rolled his eyes. 

“Well what did you say to him.” Hunk was skeptical. Lance tended to come across as arrogant, which didn’t always lend itself well to connecting with patients. 

“I told him that I knew he was scared, but that it was okay.” 

“You see, that’s your problem.” Hunks comment was met with a blank stare. “You told him how he felt, you didn’t listen to how he felt. No one wants to be told they’re scared, you should know better than anyone that pride can get in the way of admitting things.” 

Before Lance could come forth with a rebuttal to the whole ‘pride’ jab Hunk had inadvertently thrown his way, Coran joined them at their table. “Good afternoon boys. Wait, is it afternoon or morning, I can never quite tell these days. What would you consider noon to be?” 

Both boys were startled by their superior’s presence. Attendings usually ate with another attendings. Hunk was the first one to get a word out. “Uh, I would consider it to be afternoon.” 

“Wonderful, then I was right.” Coran is what Lance’s grandmother would call ‘an odd old bird.’ While age-wise he was somewhere in his late 30’s, his vocabulary and mannerisms seemed to come straight out of a nursing home. “Dr. Sanchez-McClain, you were working with our Mr. Klaizap earlier, yes?” 

“That is correct.” Rumor had it that sleep deprived interns could become hypnotized by Coran’s mustache. Despite still being at the beginning of his 48-hour shift, Lance couldn’t stop staring at the orange facial hair bouncing up and down. 

“What a strange young lad he was.” Coran continued, unaware that now both of the men were staring at his mustache. “When I suggested removing his gallbladder, he flat out refused. He told me ‘no one stabs Klaizap.’ It’s too bad too, he’s a great candidate for surgery. I guess I’ll never understand teenagers.” 

"That’s ridiculous.” Lance managed to tear himself away from the mustache. “I understand that he’s afraid of needles, but with laparoscopic technology, it’s an incredibly safe procedure.” 

“Patients have their own reasons for doing things.” Coran shrugged. “If you can get him to agree then I will schedule the surgery. But if he won’t then we will treat it medically and try again next time he comes in with the same problem.” 

* * *

As the afternoon turned to evening, Lance decided to try one more time to get Klaizap to listen. The man wasn’t listening to reason, but eventually he would have to break. It was nearing the end of normal visiting hours, after which only immediate family was allowed in the patient’s room. Scrambling through the groups of people haphazardly wandering in and out of the patient’s rooms, Lance ran into the last person he wanted to see. 

“What are you doing in front of my patient’s room?” Lance shot Keith an accusatory look. 

“It’s a double room, my patient shares the other half.” Keith barely looked up from his chart. “But by all means, go on finding new ways to impede my work.” 

“You know, you walk around here thinking that you’re the best intern in this place, but I’ve got news for you. I talked to Shiro today and he said you and I are neck-in-neck. I could overtake you at any moment.” If Lance could convince Klaizap to get the cholecystectomy, then maybe that would be what it takes to move forward. 

Regardless, whatever Lance said made Keith give him his undivided attention. “Don’t try to tell me you know what I’m thinking. You know nothing about what I’m thinking, so why don’t you go in the room and work with your patient, and leave me to care for mine.” 

Lance opened his mouth to say something, but decided to leave it at that. Instead, he was going to give Klaizap the speech he had planned out on the walk over. But as he entered the room, Lance noticed something strange. “Hey, where’s your family? Are they out getting food?” 

“No, we live kind of far away so I came here on my own.” Klaizap looked sheepishly at the ground. “But I’m the bravest person in our entire town, I can handle a couple of gallstones on my own.” 

Then Lance understood. Klaizap wasn’t just being stubborn or stupid. He had come a long way on his own and didn’t have anyone to support him. Lance took a seat in the chair next to the bed. “You know, when I was a freshman in college I got in a little car accident. It was pretty bad, and I ended up in the hospital. My mom was freaking out and almost hopped on the next flight out of Miami, but I stopped her. I was the oldest and she needed to be there to take care of my younger sibling. I told her I was fine, but I’m going to be honest. I was terrified. But I couldn’t say anything because my pride got in the way. Luckily my roommate was able to help me out. I didn’t know him very well before that, but he never judged me for being scared. I don’t think I could have gotten through it without him.” 

Klaizap didn’t speak. They sat in silence for a few minutes before he finally responded. “I’m also the oldest. It’s a lot of responsibility.”

“It totally is. I can’t tell you how much of my childhood was spend looking after my little siblings. Every time someone would call to hang out, I would have to say ‘sorry I can’t, I’m babysitting.’” Lance laughed, and it was a genuine laugh. He hadn’t been expecting that. 

“I know! I got invited to this big party a couple weeks ago and had to miss it because my Mom decided her date night was more important than my party.” Klaizap seemed more relaxed too. 

“How many siblings do you have?” If there had been tension in the air, it had already dissipated. 

“I have a brother and three sisters.” Klaizap held up 4 fingers on his hand to demonstrate, as if addition hadn’t been part of the required training for becoming a doctor. 

“I’ve got you beat, I’m the oldest of 6.”

Klaizap scoffed. “Whatever, I’m sure my siblings are way needier than yours.” 

“Those sound like fighting words. Maybe we need to settle this like men.” Lance grabbed the Jenga set. As he did, his pager went off. He looked across the room at Keith, who had gotten the same page at the same time. Guess neither of them had been particularly impressive or horrible. 

“Do you have to get that?” Klaizap asked. 

Lance thought. “Nah, he’s got it. Whatever it is, it can’t be as important as beating you at Jenga.” 

“That doesn’t sound like something a real doctor would say.” Klaizap gave Lance a faux suspicious look. 

By that time, Keith had already run out of the room. There was no going back, Lance had officially blew his chance of being the first intern in the OR. He had probably just made a huge mistake. But instead of beating himself up about it, he smiled, put a finger over his mouth and said “shh, don’t let my secret out.” 

* * *

By the end of the night, Lance had convinced Klaizap to get the surgery. Of course, he had to win a game of ultimate Jenga first- a combination of Jenga, hopscotch, and trivial pursuit. He was at a bit of an advantage considered Klaizap was bedridden due to his gallstones, nevertheless, he earned that victory. He had even managed to get a couple hours of sleep in the on-call room, and as he stepped out into the hall to begin a new day of work, he was stopped by Coran. 

“I just got done talking to Mr. Klaizap.” Lance was paying limited attention to Coran’s words. The legends were true. If the mustache had been mesmerizing the day before, it had transformed into a religious experience now. “Good job convincing him on getting the surgery.” 

“Thank you sir.” He tilted his head to get a better view of the mustache. It engulfed him. 

“You know, most interns come in here will do anything to get into an OR. But last night you gave up an opportunity for surgery because a patient needed you. There is a lot we can do to save lives before we even scrub in.” Coran’s words pulled Lance out of his trance. “I’ve seen good doctors come through here who care only about stats and awards and getting patients on and off the table, but I’ve never seen a great one who didn’t put patient care over personal glory. I think you have the makings of a great doctor.” 

“Oh, yes, um. . .” Lance scrambled for words. “I believe that healing a person’s body isn’t enough, um, you have to heal their hearts as well. Like, emotionally.” 

“That’s a wise thought, Dr. Sanchez-McClain.” Although not one that was entirely well said. “That’s why I want you to assist on the surgery. It’s laparoscopic so there isn’t much you can do, but I’ll need someone to wipe my brow for me.” 

“I’m your man, anything you need.” As Coran walked off, Lance leaned against the wall. He closed his eyes, taking in the moment. It wasn’t like Grey’s Anatomy or any of those medical shows. Meredith Grey and her gang spent almost every day in the OR assisting on complex procedures. And here he was getting excited over forehead sweat. Lance Sanchez-McClain should not be satisfied with wiping forehead sweat, he knew he had the skills to do the big surgeries. Even so, his foot was in the door. 

“Don’t fall asleep, you’ll be late for rounds.” An unexpected voice brought him back to reality. 

“What are you doing here, Mullet?” Bitterness seeped in. He hadn’t done Shiro’s surgery last night, which meant that Keith did. That means he lost the bet and was at the will of his rival. 

Keith paused for a second before responding. “Why didn’t you answer Shiro’s page last night? Why did you let me win?” 

“Why does it matter?” Lance yawned as he spoke. Keith’s response was not what Lance had expected. He had expected more bragging and gloating, like he would have done. “I was busy with something else.” 

“Busy? You were playing fucking Jenga with some teenager instead of actually doing your job!” Lance had never seen Keith actually angry before. But the anger was infectious. 

“He’s just a kid and he had nobody! My job is to take care of my patient and that’s what I did. If you want to get up in my face about winning our bet, then fine. Go ahead and brag. Take your shots, tell me what you want me to do. I don’t care. I know I made the right decision and that is what matters.” In truth, he didn’t know if he had made the right decision. There would always be that tiny bit of guilt where he would think maybe things would have been different. But it was the decision he made and he couldn’t take it back. 

Keith was taken aback. “This isn’t just about a bet. I couldn’t care less about a bet or a prize or anything. I just-“ He stopped. “Whatever, the bet is off, I don’t want anything.” 

“No, you have to make a decision.” It was weird that Lance was arguing against his own interest, but he was too far in. “You won fair and square, that means I’ll do whatever you want me to do. I don't want your charity.” 

“Fine, you want me to tell you what to do? Tomorrow night when we get off work we can go to the Olive Garden over on 3rd. You’ll buy me dinner.” Keith started heading towards the nurse’s station to grab his charts. 

“Wait!” Lance chased after him. “Out of everything you could choose, why have me. . . buy you dinner.” 

“Because I want questionable Italian food and have no money.” Keith kept his back turned, not bothering to make eye contact. “Those are the terms of my victory.”

“Well then why not just have me give you money? Why do I have to go with you?” Lance pressed.

Keith turned to face him, their eyes meeting once again, but the feeling completely different. His gaze was intense, but not filled with disdain as it had been just moments earlier. The corners of his mouth lifted into a slight smirk. “What fun would that be?”  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those of you who are wondering what "extreme Jenga" is, the object of the game is very similar to regular Jenga. First you take a Jenga piece, as usual, but they you hopscotch backwards about 4-8 paces, depending on what you get on the initial dice roll (two dice are rolled, divide the sum of the two dice by three, round to the nearest whole number, and add that to 3.) After you reach your destination, you will be given a trivia question to answer. If you answer correctly, your turn is done. If you answer incorrectly, you must turn around and gently toss your Jenga piece in the direction of the tower. If the tower falls at any point in your turn, you lose.


	3. The (Totally Not) Date

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance lost the best and it is time to pay up, by accompanying his rival Keith for dinner. But despite the situation being nothing more than a series of unfortunate decisions, his friends have are convinced that this rendezvous is really a date in disguise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, this chapter takes place at Olive Garden. The thing is, I haven't been to Olive Garden since the Bush years. I know they serve breadsticks and I looked at the menu online, but if there are any Olive Garden fans who are going to take issue with my characterization of the restaurant, let me just say: I literally have no idea what I'm doing. I have no idea why I decided to make them go to Olive Garden, that doesn't make much sense. I've eaten at restaurants before, I've been on the date where you get Italian food before. I've awkwardly dropped that Italian food on my lap because I couldn't figure out how to get it on my fork and left the restaurant in disgrace before. I may not know Olive Garden, but I do know awkward dates. So if you have a problem, come at me scrublord. I'm fucking ripped.

To a surgical intern, the hospital is everything. It is where they spend most of their time, with 80-hour work weeks that don’t include getting to there early to snatch the good cases. Even when they go home, all they can think about is the hospital. Today, Lance wasn’t thinking about the hospital. All he could think about was his activities after he left. Today was the day that Lance was getting dinner with his painfully attractive bitter rival after work. Just the two of them. And as he picked at his scone during his mid-morning coffee gab session with his friends, it was apparent that his mind wasn’t there that day.

“What’s the matter, you seem out of it?” Hunk sounded concerned. He had heard through the grapevine that Keith had been the first intern to scrub in on a surgery, and even though Lance scrubbed in not long after, he was worried that it was hitting Lance hard.

Pidge was a touch more informed with what had gone down the day prior. “He’s probably just stressing out over his date tonight.”

“What?” Lance looked up, bits of scone flying from his mouth. “I don’t have a date tonight. I lost a bet and have to buy a colleague dinner. A colleague whom I hate. There is nothing date-like about it.”

Pidge turned to their other friend. “Hunk tell me. If you were going to dinner at a typical date-night restaurant with a person you have strong feelings for, whatever those feelings are, and you were the one paying for it, what would you call that?”

“I would call that a date.” Hunk felt nice that he was being included. Not that he wasn’t valued as a friend, but sometimes Pidge would go off on their own little tangents and the world would close off to anyone else.

“You’re not helping, dude.” Lance glared. “It’s not a date. One, we are both men. And two, I hate the guy.”

“So it’s a hate-date. Still a date none the less.” For the sake of complete honesty, Pidge had been waiting for a situation to use the term ‘hate-date’ and was grateful for an opportunity to use it.

“Okay, but we’re still both guys.” Lance was a little ticked that he had to continue arguing this.

“Why is that an issue?” Hunk asked. “You’ve been eyeing him like a hungry wolf ever since you got here.”

“I’ll admit that he’s attractive. I’m big enough to recognize when men are attractive. For example, I myself am very attractive. While Keith is not quite to my level, he has a nice face. And skin. And body.” A little bit of self-indulgent narcissism always cheered Lance up. “But it can’t be a date because I’m not gay. I know this because I made out with half the guys in my fraternity and it never really did it for me.”

Hunk and Pidge didn’t respond for a solid minute. Pidge broke the silence. “So, you know you aren’t gay because you make out with guys.”

“Well it sounds ridiculous when you say it like that.”

* * *

Lance thought about what Pidge and Hunk had said earlier as he waited in the locker room for Keith. Their shift had been over for about 15 minutes, but Keith had yet to show up. Certainly, there were plenty of reasonable explanations, but Lance couldn’t help but feel like he was stood up for their not-date.

“Sorry I’m late.” A voice came from behind him. He turned to see Keith fresh out of the shower, hair glistening with moisture with beads of water dripping down his lightly clothed body. “This kid in the ER puked on me and I had to clean myself up.”

“Cute.” Lance rolled his eyes. At least Keith had a good reason, he knew full well the vomit-soaked woes of a shift in the pit. “Just what I needed to build up an appetite.”

He and Keith started walking toward the exit. “Would you have preferred that I skipped the shower and came as is?”

“Ideally vomit would play no role in my dinner plans”

Keith chuckled. “I agree with you there.”

Lance had never heard Keith laugh before. At least not a laugh that wasn’t flavored with disdain. It took him a second to respond. “Um, so did you want to drive over separately, or we can just take my car and I can drop you off back here after dinner.”

“I don’t have a car, I just take the bus.” Keith replied. “But there should be a bus stop not too far from the restaurant, so I can probably walk.”

“How far away do you live? I could probably give you a ride home.” Lance responded without thinking. He had had to chauffeur his siblings around for so many years, he got used to just driving people without question.

“You really don’t have to.” Lance was going to press the issue further, but they had reached his car. It wasn’t a particularly nice car. It was old, he had bought it cheap in college off one of his fraternity brothers, but it still got him from point A to point B.

Keith reached out for the passenger side door. He tried to open it, but it wasn’t budging. “Did you forget to unlock the car?”

“Of course, I didn’t forget. The door just jams a little.” Lance stepped in and grabbed the door. “Let me get it for you.”

The drive to the restaurant was quiet. It occurred to Lance that, even though it was not a date and he had to be the one to open the door because it wouldn’t move otherwise. And yet he hadn’t felt such an awkward high school date vibe since his junior prom when his date Julie Jia couldn’t get within 5 feet of him without breaking into a nervous giggle fit. She ended up puking in the ladies’ room and had to go home before Lance even had a chance to try for a quickie. Now that he thought about it, he was feeling a bit nauseous.

“Hi, welcome to Olive Garden. My name is Miranda and I will be your server for the evening. Can I get you started with an order of breadsticks?” It was a stupid question, they were going to eat as many breadsticks as was humanly possible until they had no room for their actual dinner so they have to box it up and take it home.

“Can I see your wine menu?” Keith didn’t beat around the bush.

“Oh no, we’re not doing that.” Lance stopped him. “I have rent to pay, I’m not buying fancy wine. Do you prefer white or red?”

“Red.”

“Great, I’ll have the cheapest red wine you have.” The waitress went off to get them started.

“Are you always this cheap or did you save it special for me?” Keith questioned.

Lance wasn’t sure if he was being snobbish or playful, but either way it would was preferable to awkward silence. “Don’t look at me like that, I have a family to feed.”

“Oh” Keith looked shocked. “I didn’t know you were married.”

Lance realized how his statement could be taken. “Oh God no. I’m super single right now. I just mean that I have a lot of siblings and send them money every month.”

Keith still looked a bit surprised. “I didn’t peg you for that type.”

“What? A family man?”

“No, a decent human being.” At that point the waitress came back to the table.

“Sorry for the wait.” Lance hadn’t noticed a wait at all. “Are you ready to order?”

* * *

They paused the small talk to eat their food. Lance had been enjoying the conversation so much, he almost forgot that he hated the guy. Still, it wasn’t like when he went out to grab food with his friends back in college. That was to be expected, after all, they weren’t friends. But his mouth felt really dry and he never noticed before how sweaty his hands got. There was also no attractive way that he could figure to eat pasta. Not that he was concerned with looking attractive. Except that he was. Really concerned. Normally he would just slurp the noodles but then the sauce would drip down his lips. Maybe he could try to twist it on the fork. He kept twisting and twisting. He’d been twisting for too long. It wasn’t staying on the fork. God, eating in front of other people was stressful.

“So why did you become a doctor?” Lance decided that talking always made things better.

“Do I need a reason?” Keith wasn’t one for awkward small talk. He wasn’t one for sharing personal details of his life with people he barely knew. Frankly, he wasn’t one for sharing personal details of his life with anyone.

Lance scoffed. “Of course, you do. I’m up to my ears in debt from medical school and I spend my days disimpacting bowels.”

“Okay, so what is your big reason, hotshot.” While normally Keith really didn’t care why people act the way they do, there was something about Lance that intrigued him.

“I wanted to save lives.” Lance took a bite of his food. “When I was a kid I watched a doctor save a guy’s life on an airplane. It was the coolest thing I had ever seen, he just jumped out of his seat and saved the guy. He was a real hero. So I thought, if that’s what doctors do, then I should become one.”

“It’s not what all doctors do.” Keith muttered barely loud enough or Lance to hear?

“I’m sorry, what was that?” “Nothing, it’s just. . .” Keith took a deep breath. He wasn’t normally one for sharing, but the words felt like they were going to jump out of him. “When I was 14 my dad had a heart attack. There was. . . this doctor I knew. I asked her for help but she said that she was too busy. She didn’t think it was a heart attack, she thought it was. . . something else. But it was a heart attack. We lived pretty far out in the desert, my father wasn’t a fan of crowds, and by the time the ambulance arrived it was too late.”

“Oh my god.” That was not what Lance was expecting. “I’m so sorry for your loss man, it sounds like she was a pretty shitty doctor.”

Keith took a big sip of his wine. “No, she was an amazing doctor. I bet she still is. But she was a shitty person, and I guarantee that hasn’t changed. But it’s not enough just to be good at cutting people open. If you want to know why I became a doctor, that’s why. She let her personal feelings get in the way of her medical judgement and someone died because of it. So things like this wouldn’t happen again.”

Lance didn’t know how to respond. In his view, developing personal relationships with patients helped with patient care, within limits. His personal relationship with Klaizap was what convince him to get the surgery. But it also took Lance away from being able to help Shiro’s patient. Still, it wasn’t as if he left the other patient to die. He acted in the best interest of his patient, his medical judgement was sound. That didn’t take away the feeling that he did something wrong.

“Oh god, now I’m Dr. Overshare.” Keith took Lance’s silence as a bad sign. “Listen, I’m okay now. Yeah, it sucked losing my dad but I got over it. It inspires me, that’s all. Just like your airplane guy.”

“Hey Keith.” Lance started. “I’m totally going to deny that I ever said this, but I’m glad you told me. I think you’re a good doctor, twice as good as that other doctor will ever be.”

“Aw, are we having a bonding moment?” Keith teased.

“No we are not. This never happened. Now shut up and finish your meal, I paid good money for that.”

* * *

The drive home was less awkward than the drive to the restaurant. They were able to maintain light conversation, despite frequent interruptions from Siri giving directions. Keith’s apartment wasn’t actually that far from Lance’s. He pulled into the parking lot behind the complex. “This is your stop.”

“What, you aren’t going to walk me to my door?” Keith teased as he opened the car door.

Lance sighed dramatically. “Fine, if you insist.”

It was only a couple of feet to the back door of the complex. The two paused as they reached it. “Well, thanks for the ride. And for dinner.”

“Well you won the bet.” For a reason Lance couldn’t really explain, his heart felt like it was going to burst out of his chest it was beating so fast. “Thanks for going easy on me.”

“The night’s still young.” Keith laughed. Lance froze. Keith didn’t mean that he wanted him to. . . come up to his apartment with him. “Unfortunately, I’m not as young as I used to be so I am going to bed.”

“Oh come on, you’re not even 30 yet.” Was Lance. . . encouraging it?

“But I have the soul of a 50 year old.” Keith opened the door and walked inside. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Lance didn’t move from his spot outside Keith’s back door. He really needed to get going, he was illegally parked. But he could not get his heart to calm down. Keith probably wasn’t asking him to come up to his apartment with him, and if he was it wouldn’t be for _that_. He probably would have just invited him for drinks, like friends. It’s not like it was a date or anything, it made no sense for his head to jump to that conclusion. But one thing that Lance couldn’t deny is that he really wanted it to be _that_. He had genuinely hoped that Keith would invite him up so he could-

Lance took out his phone. He needed to call Pidge immediately.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: That conversation Lance had with his friends about making out with his friends in his fraternity is an actual conversation I had with someone. This girl told me that she knew she was straight because she made out with half the girls in her sorority. Sorry Megan, actually that's pretty gay.


End file.
